AN: Oi, guys, I'm so sorry! I just realized I've made a couple of significant mistakes in this story. I've made the corrections in the affected chapters though and this is just me telling everyone who's already read up to this point along to the timeline of the updates. See, this is why I usually spend multiple days proofreading and reviewing lol. Last chapter, I wrote in a couple of days and only looked it over like twice, which was a mistake on my part. Okay, so…
1) I forgot. To make everything clear, I'd wanted to include my list of the play's cast and crew and their roles and jobs, but I totally forgot. It's there now though, so if u ever get confused, the cast & crew list is in the top author's note in chapter 7.
2) I just realized I would've had a pretty big factual/continuity error. In the first chapter, I stated that Mal and Ben had started dating like halfway through their freshman year of high school. That is now false. The correction is that Mal and Ben started dating just before the summer before their freshman year. It wouldn't have made sense with the upcoming party chapters and I couldn't figure out another way to fix it without creating even more errors, except to just change when they'd started dating. So they actually started their relationship earlier.
3) I realized that only one plus-one for Audrey's party would be kinda limiting I think. Strict even maybe. Especially since I've made her rich and I plan for certain things, so. I mean, I've never been to a party myself, so I literally have zero idea what happens at them or what is considered a small or big one, but I just basically decided to make the party bigger, so I changed it so that Audrey actually allowed for one or two plus-ones just in case I end up spreading the partygoers too thin in a certain scene or something. That means, with the approximate 35 members of the cast and crew, the party population could range between 70 and 105 people, give or take. To me that sounds so huge, but like I said, I honestly don't know. I'm kinda imagining a Gossip Girl-type party and they just seemed, like, huge in the show and pictures of a group of like even 100 people didn't look overwhelmingly big, so. Whatever. It's a small detail in the grand scheme of things, but it'll probably be mentioned sometime that some people brought two plus-ones in these upcoming chapters and I didn't wanna confuse anyone, so.
I'm also so sorry if some of you are thinking, like, "Bro, I don't really care" or "No big deal" or something like that and this long-ass note has just annoyed you, but it was just bothering me personally, so I had to fix them for my own satisfaction.
Anyway, now that all of that's resolved, hope u enjoy lol!
Friday night, 7:50 PM…
Audrey marched around her house, carrying a tray of baked goods that she, Evie, and their mothers had made for the party the night before. Lonnie was following as closely as possible after her with two big bowls of chips and Jane was having a bit more difficulty keeping up as she trailed behind the other two by a couple feet, balancing several smaller bowls of candies and chocolates in her hands.
Ben had also arrived early to help, obviously along with Mal, and, surprisingly, so had Uma, along with Harry and Gil. Uma and Harry and Ben and Mal were, each pair, bringing a cooler filled with ice and pop cans and bottles to put underneath the dining room/snack table.
Meanwhile, Carlos was picking up the pizzas and Jay and Aziz were just on their way back from a trip to the alcohol store to get some…less tame drinks.
They were apprehensive about getting them when people like Anthony Tremaine and his friends and Chad Charming were coming to the party too, but they weren't going to impede everyone's fun just because of those guys. They'd just have to make sure they don't go crazy and do stupid stuff, which was why Audrey wasn't drinking that night. Ben and Aziz were also not drinking partially to help Audrey but also because they were DDs for their friends.
Audrey set all of the snack dishes up to her liking as she mentally ran through every item. "Okay! Baked goods, check. Chips, check. Candy, check. Pizza's on its way. Drinks, half check—"
"Yo, Audrey! We're here! Where do you want all of this? There's still some more in the truck, by the way," Jay announced as he and Aziz stumbled through the front doors, each holding three cases of alcoholic drinks.
"Perfect! Half in the kitchen, half in the fridge in the kitchenette downstairs please. Janey, can you show whoever where down there please? Thanks, babes," Audrey directed, before readdressing Jay, "How much more?"
"One more case of beers and one more of coolers and a few boxes of, like, vodka and shit for personalized drinks or whatever," the long-haired boy answered.
"Great! That should be more than enough. Oh, okay! Carlos just texted me that he's here and needs help with the pizzas, so Ben, Mal, and Uma, can you go do that please? And bring them to the kitchen, thanks. And everyone else, get the rest of the alcohol from Jay's truck and bring some of it to the kitchen and some downstairs again? Thanks!
"Oh! And please remember to lock the door to the basement after you guys. It's off-limits for the party, except for any of us and only for restocking purposes. My parents' offices and our storage are down there, so that was one of the only rules. We don't want people poking around down there"—she handed Lonnie a key—"I'm gonna go help Jay start setting up in the kitchen.
"Let's go, guys! It's almost 8:00 and theatre kids tend to be punctual, if not early," Audrey ordered.
Just then, the doorbell went off, despite the doors still being open after the boys had come through with the alcohol. It was Doug and he was holding a crate of video game stuff and two pizza boxes, followed by Carlos with five more boxes of pizza.
"Kitchen?" the freckled boy guessed.
"Good boy! Thank you!" Audrey answered, then addressed Doug, "And thank you so much, Dougie, for bringing your video game stuff. The room's upstairs, it's the first one on the left with the huge flat screen. One of the only two doors that's unlocked and open."
The boy nodded and jogged up the stairs to set the console up to the huge TV in the indicated room.
As Carlos was passing by her though, he leaned closer and whispered to Audrey in a solemn tone, "We need to talk. ASAP. It's Evie."
"Okay. Bring in the rest of the pizzas with the others and we'll talk about it. Everyone should still be busy for a little while afterwards," the girl replied, easily picking up on the seriousness in his voice.
The younger teenager nodded and continued towards the kitchen. He then ran back out to find Uma already holding a stack of pizzas and Ben handing Mal a stack from the backseat of his mom's car.
"So, guessing you're not getting wastey-wastey tonight, huh, 'Los?" Mal said as Ben handed said boy another stack of boxes, then got the rest himself and carefully closed the door with his foot.
Carlos scoffed out a chuckle and replied, "Nah. Drinking's not really a big thing for me. Besides, I don't really feel like being unaware with you-know-who and his entourage around. I'm not even in the mood tonight anyway."
"Why? What's wrong?" the blonde questioned in concern, immediately picking up on her friend's negative attitude.
"Is it because of him?" Uma also inquired.
Carlos momentarily hesitated and answered, "N-nah."
"Carlos," Ben prompted the other boy to open up, recognizing his telltale untruthful stuttering.
"Come on, 'Los. If it's about Evie, we all agreed to help her, but we can't if we don't know what we're helping with," Mal encouraged as well.
Carlos sighed and responded, "It's not…Well, it's not not a big deal, but it's not important enough to tell everyone, but, okay, yeah, I was planning on telling just Audrey.
"I'm sorry, guys. Really. It's legit nothing against you or the others. I'm just so used to her being the only person I can discuss this with, you know, extensively. Lonnie and Jane are awesome and they're Evie's best friends and I trust them too. But Audrey's her best friend and I know that she notices just as much as I do, sometimes more. It's just an habitual thing, you know?"
"We get it, Carlos. We do. But we all wanna help Evie, especially us, man. Crap, I'm so sorry! I don't mean to exclude you and the others, Uma!"—said girl simply shrugged, truly unaffected by his comment because she understood what he'd meant—"Look, what I'm trying to say isn't that Mal and I should get exceptions just because we're crushing on her, but we get really worried about her too," Ben sensitively pointed out.
"Same," Uma concurred, "Har and I would be worried about anyone being treated wrong in their relationship, but because it's Evie Grimhilde, it hits worse. She's the last person I could think of who deserves this treatment."
The younger boy nodded and replied, "I-I get it. I feel it…Okay. I'll tell you guys and Audrey. Come on."
The four made it the rest of the way into the kitchen. Immediately though, they noticed something was wrong. Audrey was just ending a call on her phone with a deep frown on her face, which Jay was questioning.
"What happened?" Ben asked as he, Mal, Carlos, and Uma put the pizzas down into empty spots on the kitchen counters and island.
"Evie just called," Audrey answered in a secretive voice, "She apologized for not having been able to come early to help set up and she said she's probably gonna be a little late too. And guess why."
"Do we really have to guess anymore?" Mal commented, angrily crossing her arms and causing the other girl to hum humourlessly in agreement.
"I'm guessing she just told me what you were going to, Carlos?"—the boy nodded sadly—"Apparently, and this is just me reading between the lines because obviously Eves would sugarcoat all of this," the brown-haired girl began with a sigh, "Anthony didn't want her leaving him any sooner than she had to, so he 'forbade her' from coming early.
"He also has been arguing with her about the whole party thing again this entire time, so they're just leaving his place now. And to add to all of that, he's the one driving and they still have to pick up Ray and both of their plus-ones, so who knows where they'll actually end up and when they'll get here?"
"Un-fucking-believable," Mal muttered while the others said something along those lines.
"Yeah, I know. I had her promise to send me updates on where they are though"—Carlos chimed in that he'd done the same—"so hopefully they will actually show up eventually," Audrey informed.
Carlos shook his head in shame and said, "I knew I should've just driven her myself."
"She's been with him since we left school today, Pup. You couldn't have done anything anyway," Jay reassured his boyfriend, rounding the table to drape an arm over his shoulders and place a kiss onto his temple, "I hate her having to rely on him for something as simple as getting around. He's the type to hold that over her and use it against her, like he did Monday after auditions and yesterday after rehearsals.
"I thought she had her license and a car of her own though? Why does she even need him for rides?"
"She got hit in the passenger side, back wheel area by a drunk driver," Ben answered, remembering his conversation with her four days earlier.
"She should be getting her car back sometime tomorrow though. It took so long because of the damage to the entire area surrounding the wheel and to the wheel itself. The mechanisms, not the rubber. That too though," Carlos reported, the first sentence was delivered semi-optimistically.
"Jesus Christ. She's lucky actually though. That accident could've been fatal. Even still, the back wheel area, she was probably spun around at least a couple times. Could've even been tipped over depending on speed, contact, and terrain. Surprised—happy but surprised she didn't get whiplash or anything at all," the long-haired boy commented.
"I know right? They're giving out licenses like they're fucking perfume samples at the mall nowadays," Mal added, shaking her head in angry disappointment.
She didn't even want to think about the fact that had certain factors like the ones Jay had mentioned been that much different, Evie could've been T-boned and gotten seriously hurt. Or worse. All because of some irresponsible and selfish idiot who got underserved permission to operate a vehicle.
"It's ridiculous," Audrey agreed, "I wish I knew everything that had happened that night."
"Wait, Aud, Evie didn't tell you everything?" Carlos questioned in shock.
"She didn't tell you?" Audrey returned in the same tone, "I figured that if she hadn't told me the full story, she'd have told you."
"I thought that she'd told you the full story since you picked her up afterwards," the freckled boy replied.
"No. I didn't even see the scene of the crash. She'd asked me to pick her up at a Starbucks after everything had already been taken care of," the brown-haired girl explained.
Audrey clearly remembered getting the call from Evie late that night, asking if she could pick her up. Evie had told her that her car had already been towed and brought to the shop, the police had been called, it had been a cold night, and she was too anxious and intimidated to accept the cop's offer of a ride home.
Therefore, she'd called her best friend and had practically begged for her to pick her up at the nearest 24-hour Starbucks. The entire time, she never stopped apologizing profusely for waking her up and bothering her, not that Audrey would've ever refused her or been annoyed with a request from Evie, especially one so important.
Audrey also remembered the way her heart had completely stopped for a moment at the words "car accident". Obviously if she'd been okay enough to call her herself and arrange everything with the tow truck and police, she hadn't been severely hurt. Nevertheless, the feeling of hearing about a loved one being in a dangerous situation was a next-level, indescribable type of fear.
"Wait, how long ago did all of this happen? And did they ever find the person who hit her?" Mal asked urgently.
"Last weekend. And no. It was a hit and run and she'd told the police she hadn't gotten enough info. No witnesses, no license plate, no physical description of the driver, not even what the other car looked like. I think she was too in shock. At least, that's what it looked like when I picked her up," Audrey answered.
"Wait, so basically nobody except for Evie, and barely even her, knows exactly what happened?" Uma concluded.
"That's so unfair. Whoever did this to her is never gonna get caught," Jay said.
"I think we've already established that the world is crazy unfair to her," Mal commented pessimistically.
Suddenly, Harry, Gil, Lonnie, Jane, and Aziz came charging up from downstairs and Doug came strolling into the kitchen as well. Lonnie locked the door behind her with Audrey's key as promised while Harry stopped playing around with Aziz and Gil and read the room, immediately noticing that his girlfriend and the others seemed noticeably heavy hearted.
Apparently, he wasn't the only one.
"Yo! Why's everyone so down all of a sudden? WE'RE ABOUT TO PARTY!" Gil exclaimed, slinging an arm around Uma's and Jay's shoulders each.
Meanwhile, Harry took up his girlfriend's empty side and leaned over, whispering into her ear, "What happened?"
The doorbell rang then. No time. Not with Aziz, Gil, and Doug nearby.
Uma replied just as quietly, "I have to tell you later."
"I understand. No problem, love. Later," the Scot responded, giving the darker skinned girl a side hug and kissing the top of her head.
Audrey immediately snapped back into her party hostess mode in less than a second as she rounded the island and made her way towards the front doors, ordering the others, "Guys, lids off coolers, pizza boxes open, drinks out please! Chop, chop! Let's go now!"
"ALRIGHT! PARTY TIME!" Gil cheered as he followed the girl, eager to greet people with her, Lonnie, Jane, and Aziz right behind him but in a calmer manner.
Uma and Harry snuck away, probably so that she could tell him what she'd just learnt about the girl they'd recently decided to help protect in private.
That left Mal, Carlos, Jay, and Ben still in the kitchen.
"Well, you heard the man. Let's get this party started!" Jay declared excitedly, trying to lift his friends spirits after the conversation they'd just had, "Drink, babe?"
"Uh, yeah. Um, root beer please. Thanks," Carlos requested.
Jay chuckled. "Root beer. You're so cute."
The freckled boy rolled his eyes good-naturedly and gave his boyfriend's head a light shove. The long-haired boy simply grinned cheekily and kissed his guy on the cheek.
"You too, Mal?" Ben offered as well.
"Please. Beer's good. Surprise me," the blonde replied, pecking him on the cheek as thanks.
"We'll be right back," the brown-haired boy promised as he and Jay went off to get their significant others' drinks.
Carlos still looked a little troubled, despite his boyfriend's attempts at being light-hearted and cheering him up. Therefore, Mal decided to give it a shot, even though she wasn't exactly feeling too chipper either.
She walked over to her friend and bumped elbows with him lightly, successfully snapping him out of his brooding. She then tried to reassure him, "Listen, 'Los, I get that Evie's like a sister to you and you worry about her almost 24/7 and you just wanna save her from everything. I get it, I respect it, and I basically feel the same.
"But, man, you've gotta learn how and when to cover it up. You don't ever have to turn it off, but you just need to…mask it sometimes.
"Evie's coming here for a party and she's gonna wanna just chill and have fun with her friends. And seeing you, her best friend, being all moody and guard-doggish is not gonna help her take her mind off of her shitty-ass relationship. 'Kay?"
Carlos sighed, but knew that Mal was right. "You know, sometimes it astounds me, comparing freshman-and-earlier you to you now. Back when you were always the moody one. The rebellious, troublemaking slacker and now, you're the one giving me moral advice. Ben's really worked wonders in almost two and a half years."
Mal chuckled and playfully socked her friend in the arm, protesting lightly, "What makes you think he deserves all of the credit?"
"Well, I love him to death, but we all know it wasn't Jay. Or Uma or Harry. In fact, Ben's good influence even reached them," the freckled boy reasoned, then added with faux modesty, "And you know, it was probably mine too."
"Oh?" the blonde scoffed, amused by the younger teenager's comments and glad she was able to make him feel better, "You know, actually, I believe it was me who you've looked up to since—What was it? The second grade?"
"First," Jay corrected as he and Ben rejoined the other duo, handing them their respective drinks.
Carlos blushed, then pointed accusingly at his boyfriend and revealed as revenge, "Jay started Uma on calling you 'Mali' back in jk!"
"That was you?" Mal demanded in surprise and joking anger, "I always thought she'd picked it up from my dad!"
Jay stood with a deer-in-the-headlights expression, stuttering and frantically searching for a diversion. When he finally found one, he just blurted it out, "Uma told Harry about the St. Patrick's Day party last year!"
Mal's eyes nearly popped out of her head. "SHE WHAT?"
She then slammed her bottle of beer onto the counter and ran off to hunt the other girl down and probably tackle her to the ground and lay on her head until she confessed to her betrayal. Again.
Jay grimaced guiltily yet amusedly and said, "Oops. Sorry, Uma."
"Jay, you told me. You did the same thing as her," Carlos pointed out.
"Mal doesn't need to know that," the long-haired boy replied with a shrug.
"She will soon. There's no way Uma isn't gonna shove you under the bus right back," the youngest boy assured.
"Oh, no, I know. But because Mal found out about her doing it before finding out about me doing it, it won't be as big a deal," Jay explained.
"Or she'll just send Mal right back to you with other embarrassing secrets. You guys have way too many of those, you know?" Carlos responded.
"Don't worry. I can handle a match of Mal tennis with Uma. Besides, the more witnesses show up and the more she drinks, the cooler Mal will be, so I'm just gonna stay out in the open for now," the oldest teenager strategized.
"Hey, what did ever happen at that party? Mal still hasn't told me," Ben asked curiously.
He knew something crazy had happened, but he never found out what exactly. Or at all for that matter.
The couple exchanged an amused and reminiscent yet cringed expression and Jay answered, "That's something you should find out from Mal."
Ben hung his head, laughing at his girlfriend's and her friends' antics, and jokingly pleaded, "Just please tell me she didn't do anything illegal."
The boys eyed each other again and Carlos simply repeated, "That's something you should find out from Mal."
The student body president ran a hand over his face, despite the entertained smile gracing his lips. His girlfriend was certainly a handful. And that was without the help of her friends.
"Speaking of illegal…" Jay implicitly suggested, looking over to where Mal had disappeared moments earlier.
"Ah, yes. I should probably go make sure that tonight's theme doesn't turn into an unplanned murder mystery dinner party game," Ben said, excusing himself, before he picked his girlfriend's drink up and went off in search of her, hoping he wouldn't find her strangling Uma somewhere.
Once they were alone, Carlos turned to his boyfriend and said in a both impressed yet critical tone, "You sneaky son of a bitch. How the hell do you manage to weasel your way out of the girls' lines of fire so often?"
Jay pretended to consider his response for a moment, then jerked his thumb over his shoulder and said, "You do exactly that. See, you don't really need to know how to do it because facing your girl-friend's wrath would be equal to being threatened by, like, a cupcake. Actually, that applies to Jane too, so you're really good."
Carlos hummed thoughtfully, then proposed, "Okay, well, how about I go find Jane and we can test your theory?"
Before Jay could respond, his boyfriend was running off on his own search for said girl, cackling mischievously and calling Jane's name.
"Wha—Carlos, babe, no! You can't help turn every girl at this party against me! Uh, h-how about we both just f-f-forget what I just said and go play some foosball instead, yeah? You love foosball! Carlos! Come on! Carlos!"
AN: Thanks for reading and again, I hope my little changes and long beginning author's note didn't annoy or confuse anyone.
By the way, the party's gonna be like, so far I'm foreseeing at least three chapters. I'm also just finishing up my final exams, so you guys could really be getting more than just one or two updates from now through the first week of January :)
Also, OMG! What are the odds I plan to update on the same night Sof releases a surprise single? XD 3 Hold on to Me. I really recommend listening to it if u haven't already. She's such a great artist, guys. I luv her, her music, and her voice so much. Plus, she's absolutely gorgeous as always in the video. My favourites of hers so far are Space Between (obviously, even though it's not technically her music), Siempre (from Feel the Beat. Again, not technically hers, but still beautiful), Miss U More Than U Know, Guess I'm a Liar, and I Luv U and I've Had Hold on to Me on repeat since it came out. How about u guys? I'm genuinely interested, so feel free to comment your favourites of hers :)